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R o y a l O m a n P o l i c e M a g a z i n e - I s s u e N o . 1 3 6 - N o v e m b e r - 2 0 1 3

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E d i t o r - i n - C h i e fCol/Abdullah bin Mohammed Al Jabri

E d i t o r i a l B o a r dCol/Mohammed bin Khalfan Addegheshi

Lt. Col/Amer bin Sultan Al Tawqi

Lt Col/Jamal bin Habib Al Quraishi

M a j o r / F a h a d b i n S a i f A l H o s n i

E d i t i n g D i r e c t o rCaptain/Hilal bin Mohammed Al Harrasi

E d i t o r s1 s t L t / N a b h a n b i n S u l t a n A l H a r t h y

1st Sergeant/Zakaria bin Salem Al Subhi

Civilian Officer/Thuraia bint Humood Al Aisaria

)Sub -ed i to rs )Eng l i sh Sec t ion

Captain/Ahamed bin Ja’far Al Sarmi

Captain/Abdullah bin Said Al Harthy

Civilian Officer/Bashir Abdel Daim Bashir

L a y o u t P r o d u c e rFirst Sergeant Major/Yousuf Bin Bahadar Al Balushi

P h o t o g r a p h e r s1st Sergeant/Mohammed bin Saleh Al-Qarni

Se rgaean t /Yaser b in A l i A l Dhank i

Corporal/Salem bin Yaqoob Addfae

4 ROP News

8 Views and Opinions on Royal Oman Pol iceServices

10 A Farsighted Leader and An Ambit ious Nation

12 knowledge Garden

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ROP News

Issue No.136 November 20134

Royal Guard of Oman Annual Day marked

The Royal Guard of Oman (RGO) celebrated its Annual Day on October 31,2013 which falls on November 1st every year, in a ceremony held under the auspices of His Excellency Lt General Hassan bin Mohsen Al-Shuraiqi, Inspector General of Police and Customs The ceremony was held at RGO headquarters’ field and included graduation of two batches of new recruits and handing over the special service medal to a number of RGO personnel.

The chief guest also toured the exhibition which included a number of innovative models for the RGO College students and launched RGO College of Technology website.

The occasion was attended by a number of ministers, the Chairman of the Majlis Ash’Shura, commanders of the SAF, military and security services, members of the State Council, members of the Majlis Ash’Shura, Under- Secretaries, senior SAF, RGO and ROP officers, invitees, commissioned and non-commissioned officers and RGO personnel.

Issue No.136 November 2013 5

His Excellency Lt General Hassan bin Mohsen Al-Shuraiqi, Inspector General of Police and Customs received on October 22, 2013 HE Nischal Sandhu, Deputy National Security Advisor and Secretary of the Government of India at his office in Qurum.

During the meeting, they exchanged views and discussed matters of joint concern.

Inspector General receives Indian official


The National Committee for Road Safety held a meeting on November 3, 2013 at ROP General Command chaired by His Excellency Lt General Hassan bin Mohsen Al-Shuraiqi, Inspector General of Police and Customs, Chairman of the Committee. The committee was briefed on the data of the traffic situation in the Sultanate, which indicated a 22 per cent decrease in death rate, 13 per cent in injuries rate and 7 per cent in incident rate, during the period from January 1 until the end of October this year compared to the same period last year. The committee praised the efforts of all government agencies and private institutions, citizens and residents of the Sultanate on the application of the requirements of traffic safety, which had a positive impact in reducing traffic accidents.

The committee also reviewed the comments on the National Strategy on Road Safety (20112020-) and the report of the British Transport Research Laboratory about the aspects of traffic safety in the Sultanate to consider applying it in accordance with the nature of the traffic environment in the Sultanate and submit it to the competent authorities for the application of its results each in its area of competence. The committee also examined the actions taken to provide safety in buses for students and recommendations in their regard. The committee reviewed the report of the World Health Organisation (Road Safety in the Eastern Mediterranean Region).

The committee endorsed the unveiling of the winning Wilayats, governmental and non-governmental institutions and individual competitions on the opening ceremony of road safety exhibition to be held during the period of November (11–14) at Oman International Exhibition Centre. The committee expressed satisfaction with the efforts of society to raise traffic awareness through traffic safety committees in selecting the Wilayats that represent the governorates in the traffic competition

National Committee for Road Safety meets

ROP News


Major General Hamad bin Suliaman Al Hatmi, Assistant Inspector General of Police and Customs for Operations presided over the 4th meeting of the Main Committee of the Traffic Safety Competition on October 31, 2013 at Traffic Safety Institute in Seeb.

The meeting discussed the outcomes of the field visits conducted by the committee to the Wilayats participating in the competition, along with the theoretical assessment of these participations. It also reviewed the entries of other categories ( government bodies, private sector & civil society institutions, individual initiatives).

Main Committee of Traffic Safety Competition meets


Views and Opinions on

Royal Oman Police

Services

By Lieutenant/ Huda Bint Nasir Al Battashi

Directorate General of Development and Scrutiny

Interview


• Information on the ROP website should be updated especially on resident services such as visas.

• More English speaking policeman should be assigned at resident card services.

• ROP road safety has improved over the years but a greater police presence on our road will deter irresponsible driving.

• More should be done to curb over-speeding, tailgating, hogging the middle lane, and overtaking.

• Pedestrains should be prevented from entering highways.

It goes without saying that Royal Oman Police renders many services to all residents in the Sultanate in the fields of traffic, civil status, customs, crime prevention, and …..etc. As it caters to different segments of the society, ROP should ensure that these services are of high standard and satisfactory.

In this regard, Al - Ain Assahira Magazine conducted a number of interviews with some expects in the Sultanate to get their feedback on these services. Their views and opinions were as follows:

“The Royal Oman Police is doing a wonderful job of ensuring the safety and security of all residents. As the traffic situation has worsened in the last few years with many more vehicles on the road, the Police is understandably under a lot of pressure to ensure smooth flow and to cope with emergencies on the road. The one thing that the traffic police must ensure is to impose on-the-spot fines for using phones while driving as well as for not indicating when necessary. Such a measure will help to improve driving habits in the country”.

Dr. Sandhya MehtaDepartment of EnglishSultan Qaboos University

“Perhaps, the toughest task of Royal Oman Police right now is reducing the county’s appalling road death statistics. Oman simply cannot afford to lose the potential of so many of its bright young people. Yes, they are making progress. But now that speed is being closely monitored, my hope is that they will mount a massive campaign against drivers ( the vast majority alas) who simply refuse to use their indicators, believing I gather, that it looks stupid or childish to do so. I am sure that this bewildering uncertainty contributes substantially to fatal accidents. Routine monitoring and heavy spot fines are needed. Meanwhile, I congratulate ROP on a deservedly good reputation”.

Prof. Adrian Roscoe Sultan Qaboos University

Some of them even suggested the following,

Services such as vehicle licensing, resident card …etc should be straightforward especially for new comers. There should be good workflow pattern, allowing us to understand what is happening. But we face long delays during peak hours especially at resident card outlets. Mostly this is due to increased attendance. Perhaps, ROP can have more staff present.


Article

By Kabeer Yousuf

A Farsighted Leaderand

An Ambitious Nation


In history, legends are either made or are risen to power with their will, determination and wisdom.

His Majesty Sultan Qaboos is a ruler equally driven by passion for the nation as well as his wisdom and farsightedness and the Sultanate of Oman is blissful to have a leader whose sole aim is the

welfare of people while nurturing international relations based on supreme diplomacy.

Thus, the immaculate march of the Sultanate of Oman from a pre-historic era to the present historic days in perfect harmony since 1970 has been writing and rewriting the pages of its own history as this ambitious country is constantly climbing the rungs of development- both in material and intellectual arenas.

The development efforts of the government of Oman have made tangible and great achievements in all walks of life; thanks to the conducive investment milieu.

The Sultanate of Oman along with the people of this beautiful nation is celebrating the 43rd National Day since 1970. It’s been 43 years since His Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Said al Said ascended to power heralding a new era, bringing about hopes and aspirations to the fellow beings.


Albeit the harsh challenges that were posed by those days His Majesty the Sultan’s far-sighted vision identified priorities for the nation-building process, which encompassed all domains and all parts of the country in a balanced manner, but without compromising the values and traditions of the society.

The remarkable march of the nation can very well be gauged from the reports published by the rating agencies and other international organisations which are good indicators for decision makers and investors in terms of assessing the competitiveness of the investment environment and the production indicators. The available statistics point out that there has been constant growth in the local and foreign investments in the Sultanate. The improvement in the investment environment in the Sultanate will boost the national economy and qualify it to expand diversity and develop its economic base, activate the private sector and increase the job opportunities for national manpower and improve production in all sectors, especially the non-oil sectors. The major achievements of the Sultanate of Oman have been highlighted in a report published by the UN Human Development Report 2010. The report attributed this to the major achievements in health and education, according to Global Arab Network.

In this Report, the Sultanate came first among 135 country covered by the report in terms of the human development rate during the last 40 years. The UN raised the rating of the Sultanate in its Human Development Report in 2006 to

the category of the high human development countries. In the ‘Doing Business Report’ published by the World Finance organisation and World Bank in November 2010 the Sultanate came 57 in easiness of doing business amongst 183 countries covered by the report compared to 65 in 2009. The World Competitiveness Report of the World Economic Forum pointed out that the Sultanate had a marginal decline from 38th from among 134 countries in 2009 report to 41st from among 133 countries in 2010 report. The Competitiveness Report published by Institute of Management Development in Switzerland pointed out that the Sultanate jumped from 31st position in 2004 from among 61 countries to 15th in 2009 from among 58 countries. This is attributed to the improvement in all the four main indicators. In the economic field, the Sultanate rose from 26th in 2004 to 19th in 2009. In the government efficiency, the Sultanate moved from the 7th place to the 3rd place. In business, it increased from 40th to 19th. In infrastructure, it increased from 42nd to 35th in 2006. The report attributed the improvement in the economic performance to a number of factors the most prominent of which is the strong performance of the national economy. The Sultanate was ranked third in the field of governmental efficiency with a scope for more progress in the future, which the Sultanate is working on through improving investment related laws. As for the infrastructure indicator, the Sultanate achieved a leading position in terms of

Article


developing, planning, developing and spending on roads, airports and seaports. The Sultanate came 8th from among 58 countries covered by the report. The 2009 report points out that the Sultanate has been in a group that includes France and Spain in 2004 but in2009, it surpassed these two countries. It also pointed out that the Sultanate has a number of potentials that will improve its global competitiveness. Moodys’ Agency in its report regarding credit worthiness raised the Sultanate from the A2 group to the A1 for government bonds in both local and foreign currencies, and the sovereign rating of banks deposits in foreign currency from group A2 to A1. The rating agency raised the sovereign rating of development bonds in foreign local and currency from group A3 to A2. It attributed this to the strong economic performance and the Sultanate’s ability to achieve a balance in the state budget, as well as, the big foreign currency reserves, which have accumulated throughout the last years. In its report published in March 2010 regarding credit worthiness, Standard & Poors Rating Agency classified the Sultanate among A group for long terms and A1 group for short terms, for the government bonds in local and foreign currencies. The Agency attributed the high ranking of the Sultanate to the positive forecasts about the strong economic performance of the Omani national economy and the accumulation of strong foreign currency reserves, which in turn ensure financial stability. The Sultanate was also ranked 36th from among 141 countries at the Economic Freedom Report by Frazer Establishment in Canada.

In the Economic Freedom Report published by the Heritage Foundation and Wall Street Journal 2010 the Sultanate ranked 43rd from among 179 countries. On the Gulf level, the Sultanate came fourth. The International Transparency Report published by the Berlin based International Transparency Organisation affirmed the Sultanate’s success in improving its international ranking by two grades. In 2010 report, the Sultanate came 39th on the international level and 3rd on the Arab level in 2009. The Sultanate raised 20 grades in the World Economic Forum Report on the readiness of countries for e-government. The Sultanate came 19th from among 133 countries in 2009 compared to 39th from among 134 countries in 2009. At the most stable countries report published by U.S Peace Fund, which covered 177 countries and where Norway came first at the 177th ranking, the Sultanate came at the 146th ranking. This means that the Sultanate is the most Arab and African stable countries. As per the U.S based Economy and Peace Report , the Sultanate came second at the Arab level and 23rd in the global level in terms of international peace indicator , which covers 149 countries.

Let’s all pray for His Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Said health, happiness, long life. May Allah Almighty continue to bless him with His choicest blessings- Ameen


• The Royal Opera House Muscat was opened on October 12, 2011.

• The Council of Oman (Majlis Oman) consists of the State Council ( Majlis A’Dawla) and the Consultation Council ( Majlis A’Shura).

• Sultanate of Oman comprises 11 governorates and 61 wilayats.

• Throughout history, Sultanate of Oman has been known by several names such as Magan, Mezoun, and Oman.

• Mgan means the land of copper in the Sumerian language.

• Mezoun is derived from the Arabic word ‘muzn’ which means rainy clouds. This name demonstrates that rain was abundant in Oman in the past.

• As for the name ‘Oman’, it has been suggested that it might have been named after ‘ Uman’, the son of Prophet Abraham.

• The Al Busaid State was founded by Imam Ahmed bin Said in 1744.

• The Basic Law of the State was promulgated on November 6, 1996.

• The Sultan Qaboos University Cultural Centre was opened on December 18, 2010.

Captain/Abdullah bin Said AlHarthyDirectorate of Public Relations

K n o w l e d g e G a r d e n

Food fo r Thought

Knowledge Garden


Faces from OmanAl-Khalil bin Ahmad Al-Farhidi (718 – 786 CE), more commonly known as Al-Farahidi

or simply Al-Khalil, was one of the earliest Arab lexicographers and philologists. His best known contributions are Kitab al-’Ayn regarded as the first dictionary of the Arabic lan-guage, the current standard for Harakat (vowel marks in Arabic script), and the invention al-’arud (the study of Arabic prosody), musicology and metre. His study also formed the basis for prosody in the Persian, Turkish and Urdu languages as well. Al-Farahidi was considered the “shining star” of the Basran school of Arabic grammar and a legitimate polymath who was not only a scholar but a genuine man of original ideas.

LifeBorn in 718 to Azdi parents of modest means, Al-Farahidi was from southern Arabia

(modern day Oman) and later moved to Basra, Iraq. His nickname “Farahidi” differed from his tribal name as one of his ancestors was named Furhud; a furhud is a young lion and the plural is farahid. The modern-day descendants of his tribe are the Zahran tribe resid-ing primarily in the Al Bahah Province of Saudi Arabia.[14]

While in Basra, he was a student of Abu ‘Amr ibn al-’Ala’. Unlike his contemporaries among Arab and Persian men of letters, Al-Farahidi refused both lavish gifts from the rul-ing class and sinking to the level of maliciously slandering and rumor-mongering against his intellectual rivals. While in Basra, he made a living as a language teacher. He was said to have lived a pious and simple life, performing the pilgrimage to Mecca almost every year. Al-Farahidi lived in a small house made of reeds and once remarked that once he shut his door, his mind did not go beyond it. Although some of his students amassed wealth through their own teaching, most of Al-Farahidi’s income was from falconry and a garden he inheirited from his father.

Al-Farahidi’s date of death has been listed as both 786 and 791 CE. His preoccupation with deep thoughts led to his death. It is said that one day, al-Farahidi was attempting to work out an accounting system in his head which would save his maid servant from being cheated out of money by a green grocer; he then absent-mindedly bumped into a pillar of a mosque he had wandered in to and sustained a fatal fall.

ViewsAl-Farahidi’s eschewing of material wealth has been noted

by a number of biographers. In his old age, the son of Habib ibn al-Muhallab and reigning governor of the Muhallabids of-fered Al-Farahidi a pension and requested that the latter tu-tor the former’s son. Al-Farahidi declined, stating that he was wealthy though possessing no money, as true pov-erty lied not in a lacking in money, but in the soul. The governor reacted by rescinding the pension, an act to which Al-Farahidi responded with the following lines of poetry:

“He, Who formed me with a mouth, engaged to give me nourishment till such a time as He takes me to Himself. Thou hast refused me a trifling sum, but that refusal will not increase thy wealth.”

K n o w l e d g e G a r d e n


Embarrassed, the governor then responded with an offer to renew the pension and double the rate, which Al-Farahidi still greeted with a lukewarm reception. Al-Farahidi’s apathy about material wealth was demonstrated in his habit of quoting Akhtal’s famous stanza: “If thou wantest treasures, thou wilt find none equal to a virtuous conduct.”

Al-Farahidi distinguished himself via his philo-sophical views as well. He reasoned that a man’s intelligence peaked at the age of forty - the age when the Islamic prophet Muhammad began his call - and began to diminuish after sixty, the point at which Muhammad died. He also believed that a person was at their peak intelligence at the clear-est part of dawn. In regard to the field of grammar, Al-Farahidi held the realist views common among early Arab linguists yet rare among both later and modern times. Rather than holding the rules of grammar as he and his students described them to be absolute rules, al-Farahidi saw the Arabic lan-guage as the natural, instinctual speaking habits of the Bedouin; if the descriptions of scholars such as himself differed from how the Arabs of the de-sert naturally spoke, then the cause was a lack of knowledge on the scholar’s part as the unspoken, unwritten natural speech of pure Arabs was the fi-nal determiner. Al-Farahidi was distinguished, how-ever, in his view that the Arabic alphabet included 29 letters rather than 28 and that each letter rep-resented a fundamental characteristic of people or animals. His classification of 29 letters was due to his consideration of the combination of Lamedh and Aleph as a separate third letter from the two individual parts.

LegacyAl-Farahidi was already a household name in

the Arab world before his death; he was as respect-ed as the possibly mythical figure Abu al-Aswad al-Du’ali in Arabic philology, was the first person to codify the complex metres of Arabic poetry, and has been referred to as the outstanding genius of the Muslim world.[11] Sibawayh and Al-Asma’i were among his students, with the former having been more indebted to al-Farahidi than to any of his other teachers; Sibawayhi quotes al-Farahidi 608 times in his infamous Kitab, more than any other

authority. At any point in the Kitab when Sibawayh says “I asked him” or “he said” without mentioning a name, he is referring to Al-Farahidi. Both the lat-ter and the former are historically the earliest and most significant figures in respect to the formal re-cording of the Arabic language.

In addition to the Arabic language, Al-Farahidi was also well versed in astronomy, mathematics, Islamic law, music theory and Muslim prophetic tradition. His prowess in the Arabic language was said to be drawn, first and foremost, from his vast knowledge of Muslim prophetic tradition as well as exegesis of the Qur’an. The Al Khalil Bin Ahmed Al Farahidi School of Basic Education in Rustaq, Oman is named after him.

WorksIn addition to his work in prosody and lexicog-

raphy, Al-Farahidi was also considered the first per-son to write about poetic metre and musicology in the Arabic language. He is often referred to as a genius by historians and was considered not only a scholar, but an inventor of ideas

CryptographyAl-Farahidi was the first of many linguists who

would author works on the topic of cryptography and cryptanalysis. He wrote a book on cryptogra-phy titled the “Book of Cryptographic Messages.”] The lost work contains many “firsts,” including the use of permutations and combinations to list all possible Arabic words with and without vowels. Later Arab cryptographers explicitly resorted to Al-Farahidi’s phonological analysis for calculating letter frequency in their own works

Diacretic systemAl-Farahidi is also credited with the current

standard for Arabic diacritics; rather than a series of indistinguishable dots, it was Al-Farahidi who introduced different shapes for the vowel diacrit-ics in Arabic, which simplified the writing system so much that it hasn’t been changed since. He also began using a small letter shin to signify the shadda emphatic mark. Al-Farahidi’s style for writ-ing the Arabic alphabet was much less ambiguous than the previous system where dots had to per-

Knowledge Garden


form various functions, and while he only intended its use for poetry it was eventually used for the Qur’an as well.

Kitab Al-’AynKitab Al-Ayn was the first dictionairy ever writ-

ten for the Arabic language. Ayn is the deepest let-ter in Arabic, al-Ayn also means a water source in the desert. It was titled “the source” because the goal of its author was to clarify those words which were composed the original or source Arabic vo-cabulary.

ProsodyAl-Farahidi’s first work was in the study of Ara-

bic prosody, a field for which he is credited as the founder. Reportedly, he performed the Hajj pilgrim-age to Mecca while a young man and prayed to God that he be inspired with knowledge no one else had. When he returned to Basra shortly thereafter, he overheard the rythmic beating of a blacksmith on an anvil, he immediately wrote down fifteen me-tres around the periphery of five circles which were accepted as the basis of the field and still accepted as such in Arabic language prosody today. Three of the meters were not known to Pre-Islamic Ara-bia, suggesting that al-Farahidi may have invented them himself.] He never mandated, however, that all following Arab poets must necessarily follow his rules without question, and even he was said to have knowingly broken the rules at times.

Source: Wikipedia

Annabel LeeBy Edgar Allan Poe It was many and many a year ago, In a kingdom by the sea, That a maiden there lived whom you may know By the name of Annabel Lee; And this maiden she lived with no other thought Than to love and be loved by me. I was a child and she was a child, In this kingdom by the sea, But we loved with a love that was more than love— I and my Annabel Lee — With a love that the wingèd seraphs of Heaven Coveted her and me. And this was the reason that, long ago, In this kingdom by the sea, A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling My beautiful Annabel Lee; So that her highborn kinsmen came And bore her away from me, To shut her up in a sepulchre In this kingdom by the sea. The angels, not half so happy in Heaven, Went envying her and me— Yes!—that was the reason (as all men know, In this kingdom by the sea) That the wind came out of the cloud by night, Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee. But our love it was stronger by far than the love Of those who were older than we— Of many far wiser than we— And neither the angels in Heaven above Nor the demons down under the sea Can ever dissever my soul from the soul Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride, In her sepulchre there by the sea— In her tomb by the sounding sea.

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